“The Darker Side of the Moon” - A Short Story by Riham Adly - first published in The Alexandrian - 2014

This is the first of a series of posts I’m planning on the wonderful short stories of Riham Adly

Click here to resd “The Darker Side of The Moon” by Riham Adly

Riham Adly known as Rose among friends is a published author  and a creative writing instructor from Gizah, Egypt. Several of her short stories were published in international online literary journals and websites.

 Riham is also first reader/ marketing coordinator in "Vestal Review" literary magazine.

 Riham moderates "Roses's Cairo Book Club" in the American University in Cairo Tahrir Campus each month for those few yet growing avid bibliophiles.

Riham has also started her own writing group on FB "Rose's Fiction Writing Club" to motivate her students to keep on writing and sharing their work with emerging and aspiring writers from around the world. . Data from Author

“The Darker Side of the Moon” is a very moving story about the power of Love to transform lives, generational and Cultural conflict, and the fate of innocent millions of Syrians who through no fault of their own are going to be bombed by the American military.  It is a deep story about the powerful good in truly experienced art, in this case the music of Beethoven and about the rulers of   The World who care only for wealth and power, hiding behind ideology for their gain.

As the story opens a young American man is nervously anticipating performing with his fiance at a grand musical concert, a benefit for Syria regugees, displaced by American Bombing raids.  His father is a high ranking American military Officer, his mother an American senator. He knows his father is about to order a massive bombing raid.  Part of him wants to reveal the coming raid but he fears his father’s reaction, he would be labeled a traitor.His father is very angry with his son, telling him leave Egypt and come home “Or else”.  He wonders how his father will react when he learns he has converted in religion and will marry a Syrian woman..        

The couple will be preforming The Moonlight Sonata by Ludwig Beethoven.  In an exchange of E mail, Riham Adly told me why she picked this work:

                                                        

“When I wrote "The Darker Side of The Moon" I was also trying to try the musical fiction genre where protagonists are musicians and music or music theory is used to highlight the mood and atmosphere of the story and also show inner conflict of the main character and tension throughout the piece. I picked the Moonlight Sonata specifically not just because its movements mirror the rising conflict the character goes through, but because of its history, as Beethoven was also going through a failed or challenging love affair.”

There is much to ponder in the story.  Is the young man just infatuated or has he undergone a deep conversion of values?  How will he live, will his in laws accept him?  We can wonder why some loyalties outweigh others.  

I felt the excitement as the concert begins, struggled to decide how we are to understand the young men’s life chancing decision.  

This is a very good story I endorse to all lovers of the form. I look forward to reading more of her work.

Mel u